title: UV, visible and near-infrared lights induced NOx destruction activity of (Yb,Er)-NaYF₄/C-TiO₂ composite.
abstract: Titanium dioxide (TiO2) is a well-known photocatalyst for environmental cleaning and energy conversion. However, it can only be excited by ultraviolet light for photocatalysis due to its wide band gap (3.2 eV). In this paper, we present a novel (Yb,Er)-NaYF4/C-TiO2 composite which can be perfectly induced not only by ultraviolet light but also weak visible and near infrared lights, owing to the increased carbon doping contents and optimal energy transfer between up-conversion phosphor and C doped TiO2 compared with that of solely C-TiO2. Consequently, the (Yb,Er)-NaYF4/C-TiO2 composite can present the outstanding continuous NOx gas destruction ability under the irradiation of ultraviolet, weak visible and infrared lights much superior to pure C-TiO2, P25 titania and even that of (Yb,Er)-NaYF4/N-TiO2 composite, due to the nice synergetic effect of (Yb,Er)-NaYF4 and C-TiO2, indicating a promising potential in the photocatalyst application with high efficiency of ultraviolet, visible and infrared lights induced photocatalysis simultaneously.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Multidisciplinary Research for Advanced Materials, Tohoku University, 2-1-1, Katahira, Aoba-ku, Sendai 980-8577, Japan.
authors.forename: Xiaoyong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.forename: Shu
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Yin
authors.forename: Qiang
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Dong
authors.forename: Bin
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Yuhua
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Tohru
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Sekino
authors.forename: Soo Wohn
authors.initials: SW
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.forename: Tsugio
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Sato